the good father
by sibbyhylands
Summary: Gohan has a dilemma and Goku's on a mission to solve it. The story also features vegeta.


Something I wrote at work today.

Son Goku was normally a simple man. He just loved to let his mind wonder while he

enjoyed endless walks in the forest. He was never one to over analyze or obsess over anything.

However, his mind kept going back to his conversation with his oldest son the night before. Usually it

was normal to hear Gohan on the phone with his girlfriend, apologizing. Videl had a feisty personality

and Gohan tended to stick his foot in his mouth, a lot. "No, no, Videl! That's not what I mean!" Gohan's

panicked voice reached his father's ears who was stuffing his face at the dinner table. After about five

more minutes of that and Gohan never coming down to eat dinner, caused his father to worry. Gohan

skipping a meal would be like him enjoying needle pricks. An unpleasant sensation of extreme panic

went through him.

"Aren't you going to finish your dinner, Goku?" Chi chi asked, with her brow raised.

What was going on tonight? Her oldest didn't come down to dinner at all and now her husband stopped

eating just after 20 small bowls of rice."Chi," Goku said with a hard glint in his eye. "Save me 10 bowls of

rice because I'm going up to see Gohan." Goku stood up, squared his shoulders and made a fist. "I don't

know what happened, Chi, but it wasn't good. It just wasn't good."

To say Gohan looked relatively okay and not beaten, bloody or feverish with some kind

of grave illness was a shock to Goku. He did look upset. He sat on the edge of his bed with his head bent

down and one hand was grabbing at his glossy spikes. "I suppose you heard me down there, "Gohan said

glumly. "Yeah, son. However, we hear you apologize every night so I only got concerned when you

didn't come down to dinner. What is the problem Gohan? I want to help." So Gohan proceeded to fill his

father in and Goku sympathized with him as Gohan's typical inability to figure Videl's moods out

reminded him that after almost 22 years with Chi chi (although he was dead for 8 of those if you added

2 deaths in), he still couldn't predict or understand her moods. What Gohan explained to his father,

however, did concern him enough that today he decided to forgo taking his relaxing walk and jetted

over to Capsule Corp.

"So, what brings the wonderful but usually absent from my life Son-kun to my home?" Bulma

asked while exhaling cigarette smoke into his way. "Vegeta, but I'm not here to fight." He said simply as

he walked right by. "The day that happens is the day I find my son playing with Barbies," she thought to

herself.

To say Vegeta wasn't pleased about his interruption from the gravity room was hardly

putting it mildly. "Look. I haven't been there for Gohan for a lot of years. He has this problem and I want

to help him."

"And this involves me, exactly how?" The prince asked, snidely.

"It's Gohan and the girl, Videl. They've been together 2 years and their conversation last night

started steering towards marriage." Goku explained.

"Bah, Kakarott, what do I care about Earth customs and earthling pieces of paper? In case you

haven't noticed, the woman and I are not married in terms of you humans. Vegeta's insult of calling

Goku human was ineffective.

"The reason is why, Vegeta. Apparently, I've never seen it but Gohan has been fighting a long

battle of self control. He sometimes dreams of hurting people and it's not Cell or any bad guys, it's

innocent, regular humans."

"Oh, and I suppose this is strictly a Saiyan issue, huh? No human on earth has these types of

feeling or emotions to battle against or deal with? Do you even know what his mate's last name means?

Satan is an entity most humans believe corrupts them, entices them to do evil deeds to people. Resisting

him is a battle most humans go through until they die." That explained some of Videl's moodiness but

she wasn't evil and he doubted she could corrupt Gohan in any way seeing as though Gohan was her

first boyfriend.

"But," Vegeta said darkly. "What would you know about that? I am surprised you don't look

out and stop yourself from walking on ants every time you leave the house. Hurting people is a concept

that has never crossed your mind. You could never comprehend why people do evil things. You are the

closest thing to human perfection there is. Sin isn't something you're familiar with. When your mate

continues on and on and berates you, do you ever get the urge to smack her? Have you ever thought

about sleeping with a woman that wasn't her? No, right?" Goku shook his head no. "I can't tell you how

many times I fantasize about breaking my harpy's neck? I've seen human women that also rival her

beauty. I've killed many and never atoned for my sins but 2 things I will never do are killing my wife-

equivalent and being disloyal to her. To me your sniveling son is just as human as he was before you told

me this. His goodness will always outshine that little sliver of sin and if I can handle marriage and not

hurting a woman after endless years, so can he!"

To say Vegeta's lecture left him speechless was an understatement. He never knew most

humans had to fight so hard just to behave well. He never had stray thoughts of hurting people and it

took a lot to make him hurt people in battles. "No one is innocent like you Kakarott. The world corrupts

normal people. Your dreams of bunnies and rainbows are child like. That bump on your head took away

that urge to kill that you were conditioned within your space pod, but it also made you childlike and

innocent forever. You are neither Saiyan nor human as far as I'm concerned. "Conditioned, Vegeta?" He

asked.

"We Saiyans weren't born as hell raising demons you know. We weren't just ruthless killers that

killed anyone and everyone for fun. We had a well structure society with different class systems. The

only ones who were allowed to execute people were royalty. Killing other Saiyans for no good reason

could land you on death row. Younglings were not born as sadistic killing machines. They were neutral

beings, neither stained with sin nor innocent. They were raised to know their galaxy, the different races

of beings that were in existence. They were born to behave how their cast was supposed to and to

honor their parents. They were bred to be good soldiers, the best. We saiyan's only killed other beings

on planets if we had to. We had ally planets, we had rival planets were we waged war. We were capable

of feeling sadness when soldiers (friend or foe) were slain. "

"So, did you talk to Videl today, son?" Goku said while sitting on Goten's bed across from

Gohan. "Well, she asked me why I didn't want to marry her. I told her she was crazy and that I can't

wait to marry her." Goku nodded and knew Gohan must have inserted his foot into his mouth shortly

after that. "She asked me when we're going to get married. I said I would like to wait until I at least get

my bachelors and at least get a decent job with that. She yelled and said that's years from now. By the

time I'll get around to it, she'll be an old prune," Gohan sighed and shook her head. "She asked me if I

didn't want to marry her because she was ugly or something." Goku imagined how long it took Gohan to

get out of that mess. "Well, Gohan, I am glad you ate some dinner tonight. You had me really worried

last night. I am here to tell you some fatherly advice son."

"Okay father, anything to help." Gohan said.

"Wait a minute son. I thought you were afraid to marry Videl because you thought your Saiyan side may

come out and you weren't able to control it. Not that you can find a decent job and be broke. I mean,

she's a billionaire and we can build you a house next door."

"I couldn't tell her that, father! That was the only plausible explanation I could think of."

"Well. Your Saiyan side is just a part of you that craves increasing power. Take Vegeta, he wasn't born

a blood lusty villain; Freeza trained and conditioned him to be that way. Saiyans like order in their lives

and they are raised to be stoic. For example, you're too much of a crybaby even now to be a Saiyan in

Vegeta's eyes. Me, on the other hand, I don't fit the bill because the Saiyans were a race of smart people

and Vegeta says I'm an imbecile that can't count to ten, even though I can count to about 100. Vegeta

thinks that had I not had a bad fall as a child, I would have been smart. The dreams about you hurting

people could be linked to your Saiyan side or it could just be linked to being a regular human who's not

perfect and has to fight bad thoughts because Satan's throwing them at you."

"That's a very intelligent thing to say father, but we're not Christian. In fact, we're Nowhere

near it, in fact." So much for Vegeta's advice.

"Well, Gohan. Humans are born with slight flaws like urges to do bad things." Goku tried again.

"I am more inclined to believe that they're born neutral, neither good nor bad." Gohan said.

"Gohan! For once I am being very smart, so shut up and listen. These thoughts-"

"-dreams," Gohan interrupted.

"Don't mean a thing Son. I know you are too good and kind hearted to act on them."

"Although it is a relief to know that Saiyan traits and my forefathers from Vegetesea weren't

blood lusty savages that just acted on primal urges to hurt and destroy, I fear the real reason I am

worried is these dreams seem to eat away at my innocence and the fact that I capture bad guys on a

regular basis and deal with their bull has given me a slightly less cheery disposition on life and made me

more cynical."

"Yes, I see, son, I see," Goku said through a plastered smile. "What in Vegetesea was he saying? Perhaps

it's not such a great thing to be so smart?" He thought.

"The naïve and innocent nature I have that rubbed off from you is slowly fading away. Perhaps, Videl will

lose some of her love for me if that happened. Her favorite phrase is saying she loves the goofy innocent

and naïve nature I have."

"Well, as long as I'm around acting innocent and child-like, Gohan, you won't have to worry

about a thing. I'll keep rubbing off on you," Goku announced happily. He stood up stretched and looked

down at Gohan. "Vegeta told me to tell you something. He said you're a sissy human boy who cries too

much and is too attached to your mother. He also said that humans have something called commitment

phobias. He said that if he can commit than so can you. He also said to grow some nads and pop the

question already. I don't know what nads are and I don't know how someone can pop a question; let

alone which question would you pop? Say, son, what are nads? Huh? When I asked him, he closed the

gravity door in my face. Say, son, you're face is flushed. "Chi chi," he bellowed. "Gohan has a fever!"


End file.
